Catherine Holtzhausen – Illustrator

Catherine Holtzhausen is an ex student of the Stellenbosch Academy who graduated in 2014 after specialising in Illustration.

We’ve shared just one of her projects here, but you can see more on her Behance profile (which we do suggest you spend the time checking out!). We’ve always loved her style and way of approaching illustration. Her use of narrative and story telling is incredibly compelling.

But there’s more good news than just Catherine’s great work, she has been nominated for a Creative Nestlings Award for Young African Visual Artist. You can vote for her at the previous link and we really hope you do!

Well done Catherine!

Google – Performing Arts

We are absolutely blown away by this initiative from Google. Using their 360 degree camera technology (which we’re sure you’re aware of thanks to Google Maps and Streetview), they have set up never-before-seen points of view that allow people to witness dance, theatre and music from angles no normal people has yet seen.

Not only is each video viewable through 360 degrees, they have multiple viewpoints, allowing you to really get into the action and see what people are doing.

We’ve shown some examples from a performance of In The Hall Of The Mountain King (you may not recognise the name of the piece, but you’ll definitely recognise it once you hear it). We do strongly, strongly suggest though that you put on your headphones and visit the site here

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It will change the way you see things forever!

Intermarche – Heroes

We love this campaign by Y&R Lisbon, which celebrates firefighters as heroes. This initiative is sponsored in part by the supermarket chain Intermarche.

The illustration style for these posters is on point. Simple, eye-catching and strong. There is the idea that all the best posters should be so good that people want to steal them and keep them for themselves. These are a great example of that in action – where can we get some (legally of course)?

Breeze – Print Campaign

We love this beautifully art directed campaign from Lowe Singapore. Using the very simple, yet very powerful promise: Breeze Goes Deeper, this campaign uses a smart visual representation of roots to get its point across.

Well art directed, memorable and powerful. Just perfect!

Mikaël Theimer – Portraits

Mikaël Theimer is a French photographer who lives in Montreal. After starting out as a brand strategist, he found a love photography and the rest is history.

In this project, he photographs his girlfriend but there’s one problem – she’s incredibly camera shy. But that hasn’t stopped him!

Have a look at the pictures here and don’t forget to take a look at his site to see more of his amazing work!

The Wire Animation – Elliot Lim

Elliot Lim is a freelance director, designer and animator from the USA and we love this animation he did as a homage to The Wire. Firstly, if you haven’t watched the show, we do suggest you do and secondly, please take the time to have a look at this opening sequence Lim did, which features some incredibly illustration, animation and direction.

Beautiful work!

Check out more of Lim’s work on his website here.

New York Public Library Opens Archives

The New York Public Library recently made 180 000 images from its collection available for download and use by anyone, entirely rights-free. In 2016, where libraries are perhaps seen by many people as somewhat redundant, this kind of thinking is so exciting.

If a library is a repository of human achievement (through literature and history, photography and cultural artefacts) how can it remain relevant these days? That is why this move from the NYPL is so groundbreaking. In fact, they’ve gone so far as requesting people to use these images and remix them or reimagine them in new ways. You can check out that initiative here. They are encouraging people to make games and other new media applications that can bring all of this history to life.

In fact, a simple online game has already been made, called Mansion Maniac that allows users to navigate through old house plans of mansions in New York from the early 1900s. What an incredible way to bring something that could be boring and somewhat stuffy (like a house plan) and make it interactive and interesting at the same time!

But how to catalogue and make sense of 180 000 photographs? The NYPL has a smart way of doing that too, where users can browse by colour, genre or date. So on top of all this, there is some exciting data-visualisation as well.

But enough of us gushing about the project, we suggest you take a look for yourself!

Check out the collection here

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Swisscom TV 2.0

This work by Serviceplan Zurich for Swisscom’s DVR TV offering is so smart and perfectly art directed.

The benefit: You can watch a movie whenever you want, after you’ve recorded it to your DVR.

The solution: Taking movies with dates or times in the title and changing them to show the viewer that they can choose the time they want to watch the movie.

Perfect.

Academy Alumnus in the running for Most Beautiful Object In South Africa

Such amazing news! One of our ex students, Wikus de Wet, has been nominated for the Most Beautiful Object In South Africa (MBOISA) along with his collaborators on the Twenty Journey project, Sipho Mpongo and Sean Metelerkamp.

MBOISA is run by Design Indaba and aims to identify beautiful objects that South Africans are producing, you can learn more about it here. It’s great too, to see that this is extending further into projects such as this, which raise some really interesting questions about where South Africa currently is and where it is heading.

To see the other nominees for MBOISA you can look at the long list here and don’t forget to vote!

To look back on an earlier post we did on Wikus’s work with Twenty Journey, you can have a look right over here.

Good luck Wikus, we are so proud!

Orinter Tour and Travel

This work by Monumenta Brasilia shows how great art direction and thinking can easily segue into great illustration. With the message (translated from Portuguese of course): You will only have nice things to talk about your vacations (sic), these executions show just how much fun you’ll have on your holiday.

The 3D modelled look and the clever way these illustrations emerge from the mouth of the character are so smart. We’ll guess that making these illustrations reality was no mean feat either!

We are often asked how an art director and illustrator would work in an agency environment and these ads are a great example. Usually, an art director and copy writer would work together in a team and come up with an idea. In this case: Booking a holiday with Orinter will give you amazing memories and awesome stories to tell. In order to best serve the idea, the art director will then spend time considering what is the best way to visually represent this. With the promise mentioned above, there are clearly a number of ways to do so. Here, the art director has decided to use illustration to get their point across. While some art directors can illustrate a little, often they need a specialist and that is where an illustrator will be called in to make the idea come to life, with the art director, ‘directing’ the process.

This eventually leads to the beautiful pieces of work you see here!